Elijah: The Guest We Can Invite

The Mystery of the Fifth Cup (A Legal Explanation)

Rabbi Simeon J. Maslin

While the best-known explanation of why we welcome Elijah on Passover is his role as herald of the messianic age, this, in fact, is not his primary function at the seder, at least not when the tradition started. Back in the second century, when the sages were establishing the rituals of the seder, a disagreement arose as to whether there should be four or five cups of wine.

The custom of drinking multiple cups of wine derived from God's promises to the enslaved Israelites. Four promises follow one another in rapid succession within Exodus chapter six, verses six and seven: " I will free you...", "I will deliver you...", "I will redeem you...", "and I will take you to be My people." Then, after an intervening verse, a fifth promise appears: "I will bring you into the land...." Each cup of wine is a symbol of the joy we feel as beneficiaries of God's promises. But is the fifth promise connected to the prior four, or is it a separate promise? On this the rabbis could not agree. Some said there should be four cups in honor of four promises; others said five cups for five promises.

The Talmud uses the Aramaic word teku to indicate that the rabbis could not reach a decision on a matter under discussion. And so the decision as to the number of cups was left teku, but the Passover haggadah prescribes four cups for us to drink-possibly as a parallel to the four questions and the four sons. But just in case there really should be five, the writers of the haggadah called for an additional symbolic cup.

How did this symbolic fifth cup come to be known as "the cup of Elijah"? Ah, that takes us back to that word teku.

Nobody is certain of the derivation of teku (which, by the way, is also used in Israel today when a soccer match ends in a tie). It may derive from tekum, meaning "it will stand," i.e., "it will remain a question." A folk etymology, though, has it that teku is an acronym for " Tishbi yetaretz kushiot v-abayot-the Tishbite [i.e., Elijah] will answer all unresolved questions." According to this folk belief, the first thing Elijah will do after he returns to the Jewish people to proclaim the advent of the messianic age is to resolve all those questions of Jewish law that confounded the rabbis.

https://reformjudaism.org/passover-mystery-fifth-cup

Hasidic Story (A Moral Explanation)

A pious and wealthy Jew asked his rabbi, “For about forty years I have opened the door for Elijah every Seder night waiting for him to come, but he never does. What is the reason?” The rabbi answered, “In your neighborhood there lives a very poor family with many children. Call on the man and propose to him that you and your family celebrate the next Passover in his house, and for this purpose provide him and his whole family with everything necessary for the eight Passover days. Then on the Seder night Elijah will certainly come.” The man did as the rabbi told him, but after Passover he came to the rabbi and claimed that again he had waited in vain to see Elijah. The rabbi answered, “I know very well that Elijah came on the Seder night to the house of your poor neighbor. But of course you could not see him.” And the rabbi held a mirror before the face of the man and said, “Look, this was Elijah’s face that night.”

Redemption at Home (A Timely Explanation)

Rabbi Amy Walk Katz

Elijah starts making a difference in the home turning the hearts of parents to children. And children to parents. Malachi doesn't say here that it is Elijah who will end war and heal all illnesses. It is in the home that redemption can come. And it is by staying at home we can flatten the curve. We all have a role in bringing about redemption. Even if we are not scientists or first responders. I have always loved the last line of the Haftarah from last week (Malachi 3). The work of redemption seems so manageable. And the end of this difficult time seems closer if we all do our part by staying put.

Press Release from Elijah

by Ari Satok